I flew with El Al through Tel Aviv. Should say they check you very detailed! Before even giving away your bags and checking in, their people talk to you. My trip started in St.Petersburg, Russia. There two people talked to me, asking where/what/when/why etc. And the most common question (as I found out later) was WHY I was flying to Hong Kong though Tel Aviv. (Why not???) So to keep it short, it took them one hour to find out everything what they wanted and let me check in.
At the check in the lady was surprised with the St.Petersburg - Tel Aviv - Hong Kong thing again. And she didn't even know what to do with the bags. Meaning, if she should send them straight away to HK or I would need to take them in Tel Aviv and give to them later again. The other lady helped her with that question. Unfortunately it turned out I had to get the bags in Tel Aviv.
I had a lot of time in Israel - from around 6 am to 9 pm. So I arranged a meeting with a local couchsurfer in the city of Tel Aviv. He was very kind to keep my bags during the day at his work place. Too bad he had to work that day and couldn't show me around the city, but he introduced me to another CS traveller, who was free. So I joined him. Will never forget how he told me about that CSer before I met him: "he is a British Airways crew attendant, but he's not gay." :)) How nice.We took the bicycles and spent the day riding around the city. I should say, I am not that experienced in that... At some moment I got scared of riding on the road next to the cars and tried to get back to the pavement. Fail. Injured knee. A week of hobble. But anyway I enjoyed my time in this beautiful city! And especially I loved the long picturesque way along the shore. I will definitely visit that city again! Next time will try to see Jerusalem as well.
After a day in Tel Aviv - back to the airport. They say you should come to Israeli airport not even 2 or 3 hours in advance, but 4. I arrived something around 3 hours before. It was enough. BUT! This time the security spent 2 hours talking to me and inspecting all of my bags and even myself. I can't say I hated them for keeping me for that long. I was even enjoying the process since I am studying tourism and I am specially interested in the airport security systems. Thus I took all I could out of the process. Paid attention to each detail and was always asking why they were doing this and that. I even discussed my bachelor thesis subject with one of the security women:)))) Weird me.
After all of that - an 11 hours flight! Tiring! As I found out few days later, I set right next to some other exchange students, who study now at the same university as I do. Well, I was too exhausted to talk to anyone after 2 nights without sleep anyway...
When I arrived to Hong Kong, I followed the instructions given to all the exchange students on how to get to the student halls. First take the train to Kowloon, then - a taxi which is relatively cheap here. It is true. The taxies are cheap. But the taxi drivers can only drive me crazy! Most of them can hardly speak English and often don't know where to go. I would really suggest them equipping their cars with the GPS navigator! That helps!!! My trip with that guy ended up in a wrong place. He brought me to the university instead of the university student halls. Fortunately I met a very kind person who helped me with getting to the right place and even led me to the reception. After that - SLEEP...
Wait! NO! When I came into my room, it turned out that there were no duvet or pillow or anything! I was not the only one surprised, because before arrival all the students got an e-mail saying we should take our own covers etc, but they forgot to mention that there would be nothing to put those covers on. So I had to go out to the city to buy all of the necessary things. Plus I also forgot to think of a different socket - had to look for an adopter as well.
My first day here finished and I finally could go to sleep. BTW it was freezing! Unlike most European countries, where the weather can get cold, HK is not used to low temperatures, hence there are no heaters! Anywhere!
And just by the way... it is still pretty cold here. Around 10 degrees, I think. Last week I spent being ill. One of the reasons why I got ill is the local people being crazy about the air conditioning. In most cases it is just too much! In the university classrooms it is freaking cold and windy! You HAVE to wear a scarf here all the time. Not that I mind...but still. Coming to HK I was expecting the temperature to be around 18-20 degrees.
WHERE is that global warming everyone is talking about???:(
OK, now I will have some more tea and go to sleep. Later I will write about some things which I have already done here. Don't change the channel, hehe ;)
